Simon Snow: GIF or GIF
by rhien
Summary: Baz has technical difficulties, and Simon shows off just a bit. * Follows "Family & Secrets," seventh year I suppose?, established relationship; just some brief fluff. * SnowBaz


Baz had just about finished cursing at his laptop (Crowley and all the members of the Golden Dawn, the Aureate magicians _and _the ancients) when Simon stuck his head in the door.

"Done skyping yet, Baz?"

"Can't be finished when I haven't even started," Baz snarled. He pressed his temples between his hands in frustration.

"Oh," said Simon. Baz could hear him edging into the room, shutting the door. Baz always kicked him out of their room for his family video calls, and even Simon's footsteps sounded a little wary. "What's up?"

"Bloody technical difficulties, that's what's up."

"Is it the internet speed? Did you try _signal boost?"_ Baz glared at him, and Simon held up his hands. "Okay, okay, of course you tried that already."

Baz had tried everything—rebooting, and _signal boost,_ and using his mobile instead (even though he much preferred the laptop setup for these purposes), and half a dozen other spells and settings. He clearly didn't know enough hacking spells. He wanted, he really, really wanted, to just chuck the thing out the dorm window and be done with it. The image—his laptop flying through the air, screen still glowing against the dim evening sky, cord fluttering behind, in a long graceful arc over the moat and down onto the Great Lawn outside the fortress—was strangely satisfying. It wouldn't help him chat with his little brother and sister, though. Not that that was happening right now. Obviously.

"Something's down. The server or something. Not my end, I don't think." He took a deep breath, tried not to growl and clench his teeth and snap. You're not taking this out on Simon, he told himself fiercely. It's not his fault.

Simon came nearer, leaning against Baz's wardrobe, by the desk. "Yeah. Magic can't do everything, I guess."

Baz rolled his eyes, but said nothing. He force-quit the program, set his computer to restart, just in case that would help, and sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose with two fingers. Extending an arm, he pulled a photograph down from the side of the wardrobe. Arachne and Ollie, at the beginning of the term. Months ago now. His step-mother was fairly old-fashioned, sending actual prints in the mail occasionally, with letters. Baz hid the notes and drawings they sent in the lid of his trunk (in a folder, tied carefully shut with twine), but he had stuck this photo up where he could see it. Where he could take it down, like now, and look at their rounded faces, run a finger along the edge of the slick paper.

"When's the last time you talked?" asked Simon, a little hesitantly. Baz shrugged. It had been a bad month. Normally it was every two weeks or so, but the children had been sick one week, and then here there'd been the run-in with the bandersnatch…. He shrugged again. It didn't really matter. They'd try again, it would be fine. He might even just call, though his sibs were still little enough that audio-only left them rather tongue-tied.

Simon said, from behind his shoulder, "It's a good photo of them."

It _was_ a good shot, outdoors, good lighting, catching their grins just right; the gap of Ollie's first lost tooth was barely visible. Baz tapped it with a nail, caught by a sudden memory.

"One time," he said, speaking aloud without thinking, "when Ollie was a baby, I remember I was trying to feed him pieces of banana, and he bit me." He felt something odd, almost like vertigo, looking at the photo, remembering Ollie – nearly bald, with nothing but hard gums and just one sharp new tooth on the bottom, sitting in a high chair and clutching a spoon stubbornly. Arachne, only two then, had started to cry at the sound of Baz's shout. He shook his head. "Little snot."

Simon laughed a little. Baz tried to smile but couldn't quite manage it. The thick edge of the photo was worn on the one side, almost like fabric, soft where his finger was stroking it.

"Hey, look at this new spell I came up with." Simon snatched the photograph from him suddenly, jumped cross-legged onto the end of Baz's bed, and held it up, tapping it with his wand. "_GIF or GIF,_" he commanded: one soft g, one hard.

The figures in the photo began to move: their curly hair tumbling in a breeze, Arachne wrapping her arm around Ollie's neck, squishing her cheek against his, and then drawing back a little, laughing at the way he wrinkled his nose. Then it repeated, and repeated, the same loop of affection, again and again.

Simon handed it back, and Baz stared, frankly astonished. "You never."

"I did."

Baz couldn't pull his gaze away from the moving faces and eyes. No sound of course, but it was better than the webcam, sharper and clearer and it almost felt like he could step right into the frame with them. Distractedly, he said, "Are you sure your friend with the massive cranium didn't help?"

Simon scowled at him. "Just what are you saying?"

"So she did."

"We were trying out some things, inventing spells, with pictures and videos and such. But this one was my idea." Simon was putting on a sulky face, but then his expression changed, fell slightly. "If you don't like it, I can just _never mind_ it. Probably."

"Probably?" Baz looked up, teasing, and a little skeptical. Simon's spellwork had a habit of being, one might say, _persistent._ "You can _probably_ undo it? You still don't check these things _before_ you go performing spells willy-nilly on other people's belongings?"

Simon reached for the picture, but Baz jerked it quickly away. "I'll _fix_ it," said Simon, sounding penitent, moving closer to take it, insistently. "I should've asked first, but I can…."

Baz pushed him back with one long arm and held it out of reach. "Idiot," he sniffed. "It's brilliant."

The look of hope in those blue eyes made Baz's chest do something funny, something a little bit guilty for the teasing, and a little bit something else. "You… I didn't ruin it?"

Baz rolled his eyes. "Even if you had, it only costs about ten pence to get another print, you know. The digital age and all."

"Sure, but—"

"Snow." Baz shook his shoulder a little and caught his eye. "I _like_ it."

"Well…" Simon's cheeks were reddening, as he obviously tried to suppress a grin. "The trick is to say _GIF_ both ways, you know. Just one or the other won't work—"

Baz stood up, leaving the photo on his keyboard. "And it's a very clever spell. Knew I had a clever boyfriend." He ruffled Simon's hair, deliberately.

Simon tipped his head back and lifted an eyebrow in a half-decent imitation of his roommate. "That's not what you usually say."

"Nonsense." Baz leaned closer. "I wouldn't be dating some numbskull. It would reflect badly on my family name, and—"

Simon twisted a hand into Baz's tie, his mouth turning up on one side. "Oh, shut up, Pitch."

"Impossible," Baz smirked.

But Simon managed to silence him, for a moment at least.

A few far-too-brief seconds later, Baz's laptop chimed. _Incoming video call,_ the screen said.

"Hey!" Simon saw the screen and turned back to Baz, _beaming_, so earnestly and brightly that it made Baz's stomach squirm, made him feel like he needed bloody sunglasses. "I'll just let you get on with it then, shall I?" he said, getting up and backing towards the door.

Baz shook his head and caught Simon's wrist. "Stay and say hello," he said, and then gestured to the photograph. "We'll show them your new spell."

"Are you sure? Only I don't want to be a distraction or anything."

"Sit down, Snow." Baz scowled at him and pushed him down into the desk chair.

He got only that awful, stunning smile, again, in return. "Just for a minute then," Simon said.


End file.
